


the great dying

by wegotodecember (imaginedecember)



Series: the carry home waltz [1]
Category: Red Dead Redemption
Genre: M/M, Trapper/Weatherman Arthur
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-09-05 23:55:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16820995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imaginedecember/pseuds/wegotodecember
Summary: Arthur looked out beyond to a sea of rolling white. Trees bare. Branches curled and rustling underneath the weight of snow and ice. Animals were gonna be hard to come by. Money, too. Luckily, Arthur had prepared but for the extra need, he did not.For, standing there, peering at the weathervane as if it was a dream, stood a man.And, Hosea, as sure in his head as if he were real and tangible, said, "Arthur, John reminds me a lot of Dutch and I want you to be prepared for that."And, Hosea, true as ever, was right.For, standing there, was not just any man but John himself.***Spoilers for the whole game***





	the great dying

**Author's Note:**

> Author's note:
> 
> No TB because forget that. Hosea isn't dead because forget that. Dutch realizes his faults and works through them. Hosea's love won't fix it but it's a background statue to lean on. Micah's an asshole because, duh. John is a wild, sunshine boy. And Arthur is in love with that.
> 
> And this is a weird little AU that couldn't get out of my head because weather is important to me. In this, Arthur works for the government as someone who details weather phenomena in his area. He's also a trapper and a hunter.
> 
>  **This all takes place after the ending of the game. Except Hosea and Arthur are alive and Arthur's not sick. This is the very emotional mess that occurs before the sequel I have in mind**. 
> 
> Title for this piece: The Great Dying by Warmer

Arthur nestled the measuring stick into the snow, pure as white and as fluffy as sailing clouds. 

His fingers cracked a bit and he let out a tiny wince. They would surely be cracked and red, split apart and pulsing with pain. But he let the pain slide into the holes in his heart where they nestled in and were forgotten about. 

Instead, here in the now, he focused on the inches of snow and recorded it. He spun a bit, still crouched, to see the weathervane on his cabin and noted a northeast wind. Smoothing his hand along his journal, he shut it. Temperature done. Inches of snow. And wind. Bustling, biting wind.

The coming of a storm.

Arthur looked out beyond to a sea of rolling white. Trees bare. Branches curled and rustling underneath the weight of snow and ice. Animals were gonna be hard to come by. Money, too. Luckily, Arthur had prepared but for the extra need, he did not.

For, standing there, peering at the weathervane as if it was a dream, stood a man.

And Hosea, as sure in his head as if he were real and tangible, said, “Arthur, John reminds me a lot of Dutch and I want you to be prepared for that.”

And, Hosea, true as ever, was right.

For, standing there, was not just any man but John himself.

And, John, child of summer and passions and wilderness and wolves and scars, said, “Sees, I knew you weren’t dead.”

And Arthur, as still and unmovable, as unshakeable as say the Earth they stood on, said, “Why, of course. And neither were you, I guess.”

John laughed. Full on head tilted back and a hand sneaking from satchel to rest on stomach. Arthur watched those movements. So languid and smooth like streams or lakes, ones that John had never been able to really swim in before. So, why now did his movements appear as if he had been a champion of the waters since birth?

Arthur pondered this with a flick of the cigarette in his mouth from one side to the next. Rolled his tongue along the paper and sucked in a bit of scent but no smoke as it wasn’t lit and it not being lit had been forgotten about somewhere between measuring stick and John appearing wayward, dreamlike, before him.

It wasn’t very John like. Him being so quiet and all…smooth. Kid was rough on the edges, on all the damn edges.

Reminded him of Hosea, waltzing in as if he was bunking with Arthur and had been for years. 

Reminded him of that talk with Hosea and, suddenly, Arthur heard something alongside the wind with a very Hosea sounding like tone.

How criminals match the society that they are in. Chaotic society? Well, criminals respond to that chaos with chaos. 

And when chaos is normal, when silence and properness ain’t normal and it ain’t chaos, what is one to do?

When you can’t respond to society anymore with the tools that you’re a accustomed to, what do you do?

That.

That was what Dutch had been chewing on.

That.

That was what their downfall was.

See, Dutch was a leader of chaos, of criminals that were from a time of chaos. 

Take that away. Nestle in law and order and properness and gentleman-like actions, and, well, Dutch didn’t know how to lead it.

But Arthur…Arthur, well, and Hosea too, if he’d reckon to think that their likeness to one another wasn’t just a dream or a simile but something stronger, knew something other than chaos. 

John. It made sense now. Yes, John, like Dutch, sputtering wildfires that sparked from raging passions. Chaos.

Of course they didn’t know what to do in a society that was settling.

Arthur and Hosea did. So, was that why Dutch, after all them years, upended everything because of change, because of the ending of chaos? So, was that why John, time and time again, bolted like a spooked horse at the smallest sign of change too?

So, why then, show up now?

Arthur took the cigarette out of his mouth and tucked it in some pocket in his wool jacket. He smoothed his hands along blue fabric and thought of brown, muddy, sticky Earth, how Arthur was stable like its characteristics, its innerness, its stability to rest on, but John’s eyes commanded its colors, its seasonal intricacies. 

He stared now, at those colors, deep and rich, and saw that summer spark. Liquid amber in an oval pool. Swam in it now, trying to parse out what was beneath its surface. And he found such mystery, such confusion, that he inched closer to John and said, as silent as snow, and in a near perfect echo, “All them years, John. Why come searching for me now?”

Something in Arthur’s heart skipped and took a right, hard up beat. Don’t say it. Don’t say-.

“Dutch, of course.” John shrugged those words away, let them fall in Arthur’s hands and Arthur stumbled to hold them because, well, on lonely nights Arthur dreamt of John coming to him for Arthur’s red, dead muscle in that ‘ol, ugly chest of his but here was true and real reality. John would’ve never came for Arthur. Never. 

Gruffly and uncontrollably, Arthur spat, “I ain’t no Dutch’s son.” And it came out stinging. John whirled a bit, shaking his head. His long, raven hair as black as night and seemingly so unfitting for a man usually so rabid, turned away and gone. Took so many steps away that Arthur felt like John was leaving for good again. Never seemed like a settler. 

On long, lonely nights, John would’ve settled for only one thing.

But these weren’t those nights.

“You took so much for us.”

That…Arthur breathed in and then out. John took a mean turn towards him and Arthur’s gloved hands curved over the book and measuring stick that were still in his hands. That didn’t mean Arthur didn’t have his feet. He nearly whirled a kick at John because the man seemed to be bolting for him. 

But John stopped, a hairs breadth away from him. Arthur watched that Earth rotate around his figure and settle on staring into his eyes. Suspended as they were, Arthur somehow had time to wonder about the what ifs and the hows. He had gotten John out of that place, had scrounged around his dead heart for some love and had given John and Abigail and so many others, strangers even, the last dregs that he had.

He had wanted to die on that damn mountain. 

In peace.

In pieces.

Betrayed by a father and laughed at by the overseer. 

But he had gotten dragged out and dragged back into this…this shithole.

Had found himself a peace, still in mighty pieces, in this cabin, working for the damn government of all people but all for something stable. Weather. Even as the seasons spun, marking nature’s instances and her pretty fury was…soothing. It was like a massage to Arthur’s worn muscles and a tick of curiosity in his old brain and maybe the dregs of a health potion to his barely there heart.

It had made not dying on that mountain seem okay.

And then Hosea. And Albert too, whose, lets be honest, little bouts of photography and his need of saving made Arthur feel so useful and heroic and…loyal. Plus, all the others that he got to maintain contact with. Sadie and Tilly and Charles and Charlotte. And so many other strangers who he had helped.

Yes, those little visits with these people who somehow allowed his company also kept him going. But nights were always lonely and silent. And those moments allowed thoughts to creep in. Bad thoughts. Like how Arthur desperately yearned for John and Abigail to find a sliver of Heaven on this rotting Earth. 

Like how Arthur had wretchedly and horridly wished that he had kissed John when he had found him on that mountain like old times when sneaking away to kiss, to hold, even with tree bark stabbing your back or freezing water pouring down your head or tasting your feet, was jovial, was as high and singing as going on a shootout with trust to guide you and with a found family who needed protecting. 

Yes, wished, so jarringly wished, that he had never been born such a fool, a fool who had always staked a claim in people who never once sought him back. Gave them Earth to rest on, gold from his heart to keep them rich, warmth from his soul to keep them surviving. 

And got nothing.

He got…

A deadbeat father who had taught him straight nothing, who did not continue the grace and love that his mother surely had.

Another father, adoptive Arthur supposed was the right word, who had kicked him out on the mountain ledge and let his lion eat him.

Another father, also adoptive, who had been betrayed by the same man that Arthur had, although the love there was differently named, and left with as much scraps as Arthur had.

Hosea and Arthur only had each other nowadays, with time together very small, and with little visitations from Albert and scraps of paper from Charlotte, Charles, Tilly, and Sadie. 

But now.

John.

John was a different stench altogether.

It was like all the different clouds rolled all into one. Wispy, sunshine ones settling in with bloody sunset pinks mushed between orange flower petals and then sudden as it were to be surrounded by towering clouds of black water.

Damn. Damn.

Arthur hummed, “Seems I did take a lot.” Arthur allowed himself this one moment of truth. What was true was hidden and John’s mouth got a bit scrunched up like he was trying to suck on what Arthur was saying to find the squishy middle. And, well. John had eradicated his ability to understand Arthur when he had left that year and had reappeared, nearly dead on that mountainside, rabid as a racoon, and bucking like a continuously spooked horse. Wild. Summery. And buttery warm. No, not that. Thoughts. Bad, lonely thoughts sneaking in when it wasn’t night. Arthur swallowed them back but it was hard, so hard, because John was there in front of him, so close to touch, to close the gap that had been wedged between them but that meant letting Earth turn gooey and saturated and what was good about that. People leave when it gets muddy. Yes, people leave. So, you draw them in your journal for keeps, for when, not if, the day comes. Arthur ground out in between all these spinning thoughts, “Seems you took a lot too.” And that…that came out all twisted. He coughed. “I mean…you took Abigail and Jack, right? They’s safe?”

John tilted his head to the side and his jaw clenched. Arthur raised an eyebrow at that. “Or not? C’mon, Marston, my dying wish was to get you out. Don’t you tell me that you didn’t listen again?” But it would be like John to hear an instruction and toss it out the window. 

“Well, you ain’t dead so it don’t matter.” Unshakable, that stupid Marston logic. Arthur huffed. “Abigail and the boy are gone. Well…not gone gone but still. Whatever. She didn’t wanna be a part of it anyway.” Arthur watched as John’s hands danced in the air for a bit, unsettled, before resting on the back of his neck. Arthur wanted to slip his hands there, settle in, and hold John close. But those were night thoughts. Night thoughts. It was day. It was-.

“Now, that’s about the dumbest thing to come out of your mouth, John Marston.” Arthur growled, thinking about John just letting Abigail slip from his fingers like that. He finally broke the closeness between them, slid boots through heavy inches of snow, and stalked inside the cabin. The door was thrown open, slammed up against the wall. Measuring stick somewhere on the knotted up, scared table in the middle of the room. Book thrown on to the only chair in the place, which had nice slinked hole in it from its spring being sat on for too long.

Arthur leaned against the kitchen sink. He bit off his gloves, tossed them aside. His hands were cracked and splitting red. He remembered how much he had bled on that mountain, how long it had taken for him to be reborn again, how he didn’t get spat out quite right because he was shaking, trembling at just the mere conversation with John Marston.

And John. John.

His steps scooted along the floor, boots carving new lines in the boards. He was so damn loud and jumbly. Arthur expected him to run straight into the table and he even peeked out to see but John side stepped it and John was there, again, by Arthur’s side, leaning on the counter and reaching around for an apple that Arthur had left out. 

John bit into it harsh and loud and chewed it, spit and juice flying everywhere and Arthur felt like throwing a damn fit but something in him told him to be silent, that somehow this was John’s arena even though John never talked about what made him go running, about what made him somehow return every time. 

But, now, maybe.

Or was this another night thought creeping in?

John coughed on a bit of apple but swallowed it. Arthur watched the action.

Action.

Huh.

Arthur couldn’t help but bite out a laugh. Hosea. Jesus, Hosea. He was wrong, just a tiny bit. Arthur wished that the old man was here so he could point it out all teeth and pride. But he wasn’t so Arthur settled for this little victory, at John as he ripped at the skin of the apple and chewed at the inner parts, at how action was how John rolled.

And that.

That was the slight difference between Dutch and John.

Hosea was right that there was a lot alike in Dutch and John but Dutch was all words and no action whereas John was all action and no words. Kid rambled his way through a half gobbled mess of words with spit everywhere just like how he gnawed on an apple.

But action.

Action was what said everything.

John leaving. That was him saying he hated the Dutch van der Linde gang for whatever reason his heart had cooked up. And damn that kid’s heart was a better persuader than that idiot mind of his. But John coming back? That said enough too. 

And John being here now, beside Arthur. 

Well, the details were coming together.

Arthur had been so sharp focused on John that the rest of everything about him had faded. Had seen the boy’s eyes but not his clothes. Worn. Sleep ruffled. Muddied up from roughing it outside. Dark lines under his eyes and picked at skin all red and itchy around his scars. The kid’s horse had it rough too. She had been huffing and neighing. Agitated. Like she had been ridden hard without much rest or even a damn oat cake. Poor girl.

And what did that action say?

That John was so hard-pressed to get here, to Arthur.

And for what?

Dutch fucking van der Linde? It made Arthur’s laugh turn bitter. It died out. And John’s aghast expression turned into narrowed eyes. Arthur had him targeted. “You leave. Then come back. You leave. Then come back. And for what this time, John?” John’s name came out so ragged. Arthur coughed a bit, and even turned away to stare out the kitchen window above the sink. Rolling, sinking white. Bitter, chilling cold. Of mountains and dead, lonely night winters. “For fucking Dutch van der Linde?” The name matched the scenery. 

Arthur watched out of the corner of his eye as John crunched and munched, then went still before setting the apple core aside. John still didn’t look at him. Cheating liar. Never good at having a poker face. Arthur rolled his eyes. “If it ain’t Dutch van der Linde and his merry gain of misfits and your wife and son, I’d hope,-” as that had to have been the first reason John had come back “then what’s the reason this time?” And for dramatic flair, Arthur said, real silent and slow like calming a horse before breaking it in, “C’mon, John. What is you? Why you here?”

John swiped the apple core aside. It landed on the floor.

He kicked the wall like a child. Cursed when his boots turned out to have holes and weren’t thick enough to take a hit like that. He mumbled and grumbled. He ran strong, calloused hands caked in dirt – rancher’s hands almost, had he been doing that too as if by some goddamn miracle that John fucking Marston could ranch hand? – through hair – it had once just seemed black to Arthur but now, it was greasy and John was swinging the hair around and-.

Arthur dared to follow John’s movements for once.

He froze John solid as he batted his hands away and coaxed that god-awful hair of his with a stripped, small piece of fabric. Action. Words. By god, Arthur would live by both. Show kindness in a helping hand. Show love by saying it. “Used to be my momma’s.” The confession came rumbling out. He shrugged. “Guess it could ‘a been Eliza’s.” He laughed, something pointed and sharp. “Never could ‘a been Mary’s. She’d ‘a been appalled.” 

John was still frozen. Even as his hair settled against his back, all tied up and tucked away. It was like…all the courses through which he could pour action were stolen from him. Arthur let the man stand there as he continued, “Had a son with Eliza. Isaac, was his name. She didn’t like what I did either. I suppose no girl worthy of marriage should.” Then, quieter, with a precision scope, “Found ‘em dead one day with two crosses. It got me questioning. You don’t walk out on family, found or not. There’s an equal loyalty there, a place for love and acceptance. And you, you John Marston, ruined that when you left your wife and kid to die on their own like I did. And Dutch, he did that when he left you by the train to die. And he did that when he left me on that mountain. Now, tell me again, that it’s Dutch van der Linde that you’re here for.”

Then, John turned around. He looked…jesus, so damn pretty with his hair back. The scars stood so prominent. A testament to his true nature. Little lone wolf dashing between sunshine summers and hiding amongst the frigid winters. 

But here, in this winter, in front of Arthur, the wolf was out and proud as if it was indeed summer and the sun was blazing. Arthur felt shivery and trembled a bit at John’s sharp, Earthy gaze. Finally. Finally. John shoved something into Arthur’s hands that he had rummaged and plucked from a nearly bit at pants pocket. 

A deer.

Carved and whittled into wood grain. 

Arthur didn’t gasp, alright, but the breath he let out was a damn near convulse. A racket from his heart shot up from the depths. He took the thing. It looked a little ugly and a little chipped down on the ears. It sure was John’s doing. Wouldn’t’ve had the patience to whittle it right around the hardest edges. 

A deer.

Action.

Arthur cradled the thing. He turned and held it up to the kitchen window to see the pure white light hit the grains. It didn’t do much. Sun wasn’t out. But for some reason it felt like angel’s light. It felt like…

Like spirit.

Suddenly, Arthur’s hat was shoved off Arthur’s head and he was being jerked forward until his stomach met the sink. John spun him around and Arthur let him. 

Arthur looked into that amber, that dash of bark that bit the back and the mud beneath water kissed feet, and thought rapid, little wolf huffing and puffing the door down when the door had been open from the damn start. 

Arthur shushed him, eased that fire down, but John kept raging. He shook his head. “Damn it, Arthur. No.” And the boy had growled it. And then sealed it as he dove forward and slammed his lips on Arthur’s.

It was a hard jerk and press then a sweet, smooth slide. John’s breath was coming out so hard out his nose, it was warming Arthur’s cheeks. And when Arthur’s hands set the deer on the counter, he had ample room to feel those rapid lung exhales and that pounding hoof heartbeat of John’s for real. Pressed against John’s chest and smoothed across wrinkled lapels and ripped at buttons. 

Felt like John’s wild was coursing through him. Felt it guide him as Arthur raised a bit to match John’s speed, kissed him hard enough and bit his nails into fabric. John gasped. A sweet, breathy thing. And Arthur bit and sucked on the boy’s lower lip, coaxing, coaxing until John opened up for him and let Arthur’s tongue in. He explored the boy’s warm mouth, licking and tangling with his tongue and nearly choking on a laugh when John collapsed into him. Sweet summer sun. 

Need for breathing came quick. But Arthur kept John close with a rapid movement of his hands. He chose to settle for the place he desired to. He laid his right hand against John’s neck and messaged there, the other hand tight around the boy’s waist. And John just…collapsed. He bit out a weird, guttural sound that kicked at Arthur’s heart. 

Arthur breathed in so sudden and sharp as if he hadn’t been letting any inhales this whole time. His heart just…gave. It caved and waved and heaved. And it felt like pieces, like Arthur was trying to loot his heart for its gold but its gold was gone and stolen. Had been for how long now? God, too long. But here, with John rested there against Arthur, head tucked beneath Arthur’s chin maybe Arthur had found his heart’s thief. 

The deer on the counter behind them.

The winter roaring outside.

Lone wolf curled inside its den.

Here, could be a new realty where it was always just them. Arthur could have his government job and trap and hunt and John could join him. Here, by god, a future possible. 

“It’s okay, John. ‘S good boy. So good.” Arthur mumbled these words into John’s hair but John heard them and he felt them too, in every knead and press of Arthur’s fingers. “You left and came back. Every time. Can’t suppose it was because ‘a me?” It came out bitter like Arthur was talking to himself in the mirror, which, to be honest, he had shattered the only one that had been in the cabin.

John huffed and pouted, the expression real and truly pressed against Arthur’s chest but Arthur still felt it. Could’a picked it out in a damn lineup or on a wanted poster. “Well, gee, Arthur, I didn’t know your big ego needed to be any bigger.”

Arthur chuckled. “Ah, sure. Always need a pick me up.”

Between a sigh, John said, “Remind me again why I came here so damn quickly.”

Arthur shrugged. “You tell me.”

John pulled back, just enough to bite a harsh mark into Arthur’s jaw. Arthur bit his lip to keep a whine in. Instead he barked, “Hey, calm it you damn Wolf Boy! I swear.”

John rolled his eyes and turned all pretty and slight and sweet with pretty presses of red lips along the mark. “You showed your hand, Morgan. I know you love me.”

Brothers.

That was what they had said on that mountain.

And Arthur had told him not to say anymore.

But here?

Arthur said it.

Well.

He waited a bit so he could grab John’s jaw and tilt him up. Met his eyes first then kissed, so slow and sweet it was as if they were standing on a frozen lake. “I love you, idiot. ‘M sorry I never wrote you.”

John shrugged it off. “I never sent nothing when I went off. Fair is fair.”

Fair is fair.

Arthur wrapped his arms around him and pulled him in. “Hosea’s probably dying to see ya.”

John’s face went shadowy as his hands twisted along the seams of Arthur’s heavy jacket. “Probably wants to match the wolf scars.”

Arthur laughed. “Nah, ain’t like that. He’s too old!”

John shrugged. “Sure, might as well bring him over.”

So, Arthur penned Hosea a letter that night, saying that a certain wolf had visited and like a predator, John danced amongst the shadows of the cabin. Pacing.

Pacing.

Pacing.

As if…well, words had escaped him once again.

Arthur watched him.

And made sure that he was up that night with all guns loaded because when a predator is antsy in the shadows, then that means a bigger storm than them is on the horizon. 

+

Come that morning, after finding each other in the night, rolling from one blanket roll to the next, all tangled around each other, John tucked and curled into Arthur’s chest, there came breakfast, there came confessions. 

John had sat on their combined bed roll on the floor. The chair wasn’t worth an inch of comfort, more so there for conveniences and appearances. He was slinging arrows together and Arthur had found it to be a song worth watching even as he tossed together a stew for them.

After it was done, Arthur sat down in front of John and shoved a bowl of stew into John’s hands. The kid’s trembly fingers barely caught it before it sloshed off the sides. John grumbled but shoved the spoon in. Poor choice. Arthur said, “So, did some thinking-.”

“Didn’t know you did that much.”

John’s smile was sickly sweet around the spoon. Arthur bit out, “And I think you came to me because of me and Dutch van der Linde.” When John merely sipped at the soup, barely making a dent in its amount, Arthur barely felt it but there was a frown etched on his face and it made John go even slower. “I’m right, ain’t I? Can read you like a damn book, John Marston. Years of us not exactly being friends doesn’t change that.” But Arthur, hummed, allowing one single victory, said, “But even if I can read the cover, I just don’t get the inside. There’s something more here, John.”

Arthur didn’t wanna beg for it but he was starting to sound it. He rubbed at his eyes. They felt so scratchy and tired. He then messaged his arm which was also feeling sore. Chopping wood and lugging them around for the fire. He was getting older, lest he dare admit it. 

And he was getting to the end of this sadness. He heaved in and out before he sat down next to John, took that bowl out of his hands, and set it aside. He inched in close, tucking his knee in between John’s spread legs and cupping his jaw with his hands. He watched Earth get stuck on floorboards and confessed for confessing was what they should’ve done since the beginning and regretting was what they shouldn’t have done.

Arthur had time on that mountain to make peace. 

Yes, he loved and still loved John Marston.

There was something in his heart that had gone all syrupy sick for wild summer. When Arthur had let John go, that was about the damnedest hardest thing he ever had to do. Shoving that hat on his head was like handing John his heart and telling him to take it. 

“You are just about the prettiest thing I’ve ever saw.” Arthur’s voice was deeper, hitting a tone like sliding bow strings to hit the final blow. John’s eyes finally snapped to his and that Earth trembled, it caved, its core pulsing through the rocky barrier. And Arthur smiled, he let it grace his features, cold as it was unfamiliar but nice in a way that lonely nights weren’t. He continued, unable to stop, “And you’re so…wild and hotheaded and it just gets me sometimes. Lord knows, I won’t ever stop telling you to quit being so dumb but it’s you, isn’t it? It’s you, John, and I love you. My wild, wolf boy.” That last bit was nearly smothered between a soft murmur and John’s sudden tumble at him. Arthur got a handful of him and then a rough kiss to boot. 

But Arthur knew that John would be a master at distraction so he forced John back with a tug of his hair. The strip of fabric had fallen out somewhere in John’s tossing during the night. And it was free to be tangled and tugged at. John winced, the sound tinged with something saccharine. Arthur couldn’t help but want that sound back but this was important. This was confession. Like church…well, if church was so sinful.

“John, whaddya I tell ya?”

John rolled his eyes. “You say a lot of things, Arthur.”

“Yeah, yeah, in one ear, out the other. But it was about not being two people at once. So, I’ll ask again, who is you, John Marston? What do you want?”

John’s rolling eyes turned narrow and this was the open space for him to speak. When all Arthur got were the gears turning in John’s head and no sound, he rumbled out, “More than anything I wanted to run away with Mary.”

That jolted John.

“What?”

Arthur nodded. “But there was…there was people I needed to take care of.” He laughed, bitter. “And I did. You made it out. And Charles and Sadie and all the others I met along the way. But I was still wrestling with something.” John slipped a bit away from Arthur but Arthur caught him by the wrist, kept him tight and close. John trembled underneath Arthur’s hold, wanting to bolt. But Arthur wouldn’t let him without these words, without-. “I was struggling with something and all this time up here…I get it now. I had loved you for a while, John. And that wasn’t all. I wasn’t a Dutch boy. I was…I wanted something different than that. All them senseless murders and all for what? A couple ‘a bucks. Nah, that wasn’t me. Not anymore. It made me…it made feel like a monster. But I found good here. Lending helping hands where it’s needed. And I made peace with that. All’s left is you, John.” And, finally, in an echo of self-depreciation in front of a shattered mirror, “’S okay if you won’t have me, John. S’okay.” But something in him pulled hard at that, couldn’t help but add, “But don’t go quite yet.” It was different than on that mountain. Arthur had felt like he was well and truly dead, was gonna bleed out on that mountain. Had told John to go. For once, he had been the one to tell John to go. But now? In a space with a scarce few inches between them, Arthur reworked, revealed. 

And still, somehow, even after all the kisses and them pretty words, Arthur felt like John wouldn’t stay. This would be all some fever dream that he had cooked up, some sort of weird paradise where nothing was complex and there weren’t demons and lions yearning to chase and eat them.

And John…John pulled his knees up to his chest and closed his eyes. His knuckles were split. Arthur’s hands themselves burned a bit. John looked so worse for wear still but the sleep made him a little more alive. But still so damn pretty. The hair covering those closed eyes. Softly covering, despite the grease and probably twigs. The softness and the litheness to John that made Arthur feel like a bear sometimes. A shadow kinda. If shadows were hotheaded messes.

Jesus. Arthur shook his head. He stood. Grabbed the bowl and walked to the sink to dump it. The spoon clinked and his feet scuffed the floorboards. The wind rattled the windowpanes and there was sun peeking out through dense, black clouds. There was sun. There was-.

“You’ve changed a lot, Arthur.” A sigh. “You’re a good man.”

Arthur shook his head. The sun was glinting off the white hills. Maybe it was blinding John. “Trying to be one anyway.”

Hands on his back, slipped around his waist. The kid had been so silent. Arthur jolted at the touch but John kept going until his forehead was pressed between Arthur’s shoulder blades and his hands were dancing a wild thing across his hips and waist. 

“No, you are. Please, I-.” John’s breath was coming out hot and heavy against Arthur’s shirt and Arthur followed his breathing, found himself panting too under an insisting weight. “’M not good at words but I just…Abigail’s like a friend to me. And that kid’s important. Wasn’t, uh, much of an example but I’m with them always even if we don’t all share a room or, well, just…damn it.” John huffed. “Abigail and I’s different, ‘s all. But you…you and I.” John stopped there but Arthur felt the continuation in the settling of John’s hands on his shoulders, spinning him around until they were face to face. 

Like they had been so many times. 

In botched ‘maybe John can swim’ moments. Or when John needed someone to teach him to shoot, to ease him into his first kill, as morbid and sad as that was now, or his first hunt, or his first fishing trip which ended, like always, with John getting antsy. Honestly, no surprise to Arthur that Jack followed in his daddy’s footsteps on that one. 

Or when John needed someone at his back, through everything, even the poor robbery attempts that went wrong or too right, even when leaving and bolting left holes and hurting but somehow an inkling of forgiving. Or on long hunting trips where waking up to sunsets with John was different than waking up to sunsets without him. 

So, Arthur wasn’t surprised that John’s eyes were blazing, that his jaw was clenched so tight it might as well have been wired shut. “Listen, I insist-.” That word. That-. “I love you, Arthur Morgan, and I don’t care what any other stupid idiot thinks. And Abigail knows that. And I know that. And that’s…running was so easy when I thought you didn’t think about me…like that. But I’m…I’m staying, alright.”

Arthur let John crowd him, let John kiss him. Roughly. Quickly. Then slow, slow. A miraculously drowsy stab. Arthur coaxed John into that slower rhythm and John listened, settled with a barely concealed whine before kicking the kiss up into overdrive again. It was back and forth. Wild dances and springing horses along open prairies, jumping from exploding buildings, and shooting off shots after shots. Then, nights, seemingly lonely nights, resting by a campfire that drenched everything and everyone in a soft drizzle of Earthy fire. A deer dipping down to lick the stream for a predator wasn’t near. Yes, one final loving act. 

Arthur hummed, the sound rumbling between them before breaking the kiss. John panted against him, eyes so wild and yet stuck on Arthur, stuck on-.

The horses.

Arthur could hear them neighing from here.

The door.

It creaked open.

John’s hands were already reaching for the gun in his pocket and Arthur had his own that he was lifting to see-.

“Dutch?”

Dutch wasn’t wearing the usual colors, the usual patterns. He was dressed in all black. Maddeningly stark in difference to the white rolling hills, the peeking sun, but one with the black water clouds. 

“Why, am I glad to see you boys.”

“Boys? Dutch, what-.”

Well, then.

Hosea too. Slinking in through the doorway in his typical muted yellows and greens. Spring rebirth caught by the mangled hands of winter’s angel of death.

Arthur set the gun down and calmed John’s spooked nature with a shush. John glared at him, harsh and fierce, but he backed down nonetheless, letting Arthur coax him to stand to the side to let Arthur move to meet Dutch and Hosea at the door.

The one thing Arthur still naively hoped was that demons would stay well and truly buried but demons, as they always do, pop their heads from their graves to eat and consume once more.

Arthur looked at Hosea first. He said, “How long, Hosea?” Because Arthur knew Hosea had been keeping this to his chest for a while now. There was no way he couldn’t’ve.

Hosea had the gall to be sheepish. He shrugged, his eyes locked with Dutch’s in some silent conversation. “Dutch explained it all to me.” Then, angry, as if this had been a tail end of a decade’s long argument. “Go on, Dutch. Explain to our boys here how you didn’t mean to kill the whole family.”

John, warm at Arthur’s back. Arthur wanted to reach for him but kept that yearning at bay. John, not so bright, dared to lean into him. Hosea caught it. Arthur knew. And Dutch wouldn’t be far behind. But that wasn’t the matter at hand, what was-.

“Why’d you leave me to die, Dutch? Why didn’t you think it was a good idea to get me the fuck out of jail? Huh?” John’s words were spitting with true anger. And his raspy voice cracked and turned brittle. Arthur decided to hell with it and cuffed the boy on the back of the head. “Arthur, what in the Hell-?”

“Shut up.” But Arthur’s words lacked any true bite. The cuffing knock turned into a soft tread through John’s hair. John looked at him then right through him. “I think Dutch here has a confession to make too.”

Dutch coughed. “Yes, well, as you boys know, Micah was the rat-.” Arthur and John simultaneously rolled their eyes. Dutch threw his hands up. “Now, I know that it seemed that I was as dense as John here-.”

“Hey!”

“Very truthful.”

“Arthur, please.”

“But I knew from the beginning that Micah was the rat!” Dutch had said it like he had found the Earth full of gold and that he was the only one residing in it. Or, hell, like Dutch had landed in damn Tahiti. Arthur turned away from the both of them, his stomach rolling and his heart so disquiet. Betrayal yet again piercing ever deeper. “See, Micah wanted us gone and I heard talks that he was willing to kill us all. So, I played along with his little games, made it seem like I was on his side to get him slow on the whole murdering us thing, but now his sticking rotting corpse is somewhere in Tahiti.” Dutch had said it so final like. Even began walking around the cabin like he owned the damn place. Getting some of the leftover stew and sitting on the only chair in the room. 

Hosea had enough decency to apologize, said, “We are very sorry, sons. Dutch had kept it from me too. And you boys know that if we could’ve, we would’ve.” But, still, he toed off his boots and shrugged off his coat. He brushed past Arthur and John still stuck in the middle of the room and leaned against the kitchen counter to take the pale, shoddy cabin in. The curious materials for weather recording. The pelts on the wall and the meat on hooks. Journals and…whittled deer.

Arthur rubbed at his chin, the beard prickling skin, and ground out, “So, you’re telling me that you turned all of us against each other so you could what, maybe save some of us, and then kill Micah yourself?” He shook his head. “That don’t make much sense, Dutch.” Then, this to Hosea, who Arthur locked eyes with immediately. “What was this about Dutch being all talk and no action?”

Dutch spat out a chunk of meat and jabbed the spoon in the air at Hosea. “What’s this you said about me, dear?” The ‘dear’ came out growling but Hosea rolled his eyes in the face of it. Like…well…jesus. Arthur saw it now. The whole John being Dutch and Arthur being Hosea thing. God. How could he have missed it? This was like them going at it. And John must’a felt it too for he leaned once more into Arthur and huffed a laugh that landed hot on Arthur’s shoulder. And it was telling, it was revealing because Arthur always had an inkling that Dutch and Hosea were something more than they were letting on but that knowledge Arthur tucked away for now was not the time. It was a time to…what? Somehow believe Dutch this one time was a thousand steps ahead of all of them? 

He waved his hand in the air, somehow effectively shutting both Hosea and Dutch up which was…new. But he didn’t break stride. He said, “Now, hold on just a minute and tell me again what happened back there because I don’t quite believe all this.”

Dutch set the bowl on the hardwood floor and leveled Arthur with a fatherly stare, one where the father was trying to parse through just how to tell his son something, whether that something be a lesson or a tragic confession, Arthur wasn’t sure. But he squared his shoulders, waited for the brunt of it, for-. “I had pushed you, Arthur, to betray me. Hell, I counted on it.”

John was the one to voice a terse, “What?”

But Arthur barely heard that because his damn mind was spinning and back pedaling. Dutch, being the commander of chaos and being able to twist it instead of not knowing how to respond to the lack of it? Didn’t make sense. And, jesus, how many times had Dutch berated him, had chosen not to believe in his favorite son anymore, had chosen instead to wrench and twist and writher in pure disbelief by Arthur’s utter unshakeable loyalty? How many times had Dutch said, so sad and true, that Arthur would betray him, that John, his other favorite son, would do the same? That they weren’t worth saving, weren’t even worth the trouble, the mercy of killing them himself. 

No. No. No.

Dutch standing.

Dutch-.

“A lot of men are driven by the lack of emotions or the simpleness of their emotions. They are greedy. They are envious. They are angry.” A jab. A hard jab at Arthur’s caving in chest and Arthur’s spinning, itching eyes stared at that, that single jab where Arthur’s heart had made its reappearance as of late. “Micah thought I was one of these men but he forgot that he was the one that was like that. It was so easy to get him thinking that I was with him, to think I was letting my sons go for him, for money but he didn’t know me. He didn’t know that I had you, Arthur. I had you.”

Dutch knew.

Dutch knew.

That Arthur’s building blocks were family, love, and loyalty, that he would go down fighting for one final, loving act. That he would die to get them out. One final piece of him left there on that mountain. Didn't think he'd make it out so he fought for others. Everything just pain, pain, pain. Loss, loss, loss. Betrayal, betrayal, betrayal. You won't stay, you won't stay. But one final loving act damn it. One final building block. For…for John and Abigail and Jack. For Charles and Sadie and the others who got out. John, leaning into him. John, slipping his hand into his.

Dutch, still poking his damn chest, still he said, “I knew you weren’t like us, Arthur. So complex and different than the typical criminal. I knew you’d get the others out. I knew that your love was fiercer than all the bullets and the hell and pain you went through. You were my final trick against, Micah.”

And Hosea, suddenly against him, driving and spinning him into…this was a hug. This was…

Arthur let Hosea wrap his arms around him. It was awkward. Hosea, frail as he was, and Arthur, a big bear. But Arthur let it happen. Dutch, not as easy on the emotions, slapped his back but that was enough. That was Dutch saying he was proud of him. And John, still his hand ever so tightly wound around his own and Arthur pulled him in until Hosea was hugging the both of them. 

Arthur felt like this was a dream he had told himself before a shattered mirror.

A lonely night thought that yearned for reconnected family, that Dutch hadn’t truly gave up on all of them, that all those years with him couldn’t’ve been all wasted. 

That John would meet him and have him.

That Hosea would wrap his arms around him and keep him too.

That all this would happen.

Jesus.

Arthur squeezed his eyes to hold back tears but through the shininess of his vision, he saw that Hosea was wiping his eyes. And it felt good to see that, to know that it wasn’t just his heart being foolish or wrong.

“Well, now that’s over with, how about you get to telling me what you boys have been up to while we’ve been hiding out.”

And there, in that cabin in the middle of some woods far from any railroad tracks or civilization, Arthur listened to how Hosea and Dutch came together again, how, yes, maybe that love Arthur saw did have a different name, how John was doing keeping Abigail and Jack safe and taken care of even though the relationship there was more so familial in the friendly kind of way, and how Arthur had taken up trapping as well as weather keeping for the government.

And here, confessions and revelations, and lonely night thoughts escaped to day.

And together, finally.

No running, no running but staying, staying.

Arthur turned to see the deer figurine on the kitchen counter, watching outside as snow spun new tales on the rolling hills, watched it fall and float like sifting flour. And there, one day, Arthur will set a whittled wolf. And, on another day, more trinkets from Hosea and Dutch to be settled next to and pressed into Arthur’s journal and the letters from friends not to be forgotten.

Collections of things that couldn’t shake a little needling storm in Arthur’s head.

For, even with all this, the love to keep the Earth rotating, he knew it was coming. 

It was coming…

It was coming…

Yes, one final confession…

It was coming…

It was coming… The great dying. The end.


End file.
